Individual tasks:
Answer any two of the three questions below. Max one single-spaced page
per answer.
Question 1
Go to the Strategic Business Insights Web site and complete the VALS survey at www.strategicbusinessinsights.com/vals/ presurvey.shtml.
a) What does VALS measure, and what is your VALS type? Does it adequately describe you?
b) On what dimensions are the VALS types based? How can marketers use this tool to better understand consumers?
Qurestin 2
Have you noticed that some of your Facebook friends like certain advertisements? Marketers know what Facebook users like and are using that knowledge to influence users' friends. "Social context ads" are based on data collected on the likes and friends of Facebook users. When you click on an ad indicating that you like it, you alsogive Facebook permission to share that preference with all your friends. Marketers like this feature because it appears as though you are endorsing the brand to your friends. Nike bought ads on users' homepages in twenty countries prior to the World Cup, and Ford uses Facebook's social context ads to promote the Explorer. Although most ads on Facebook cost as little as $1 per click for marketers, the total cost for a social context ad can be as much as $100,000.
a) When marketers advertise using Facebook, how do they hope to influence consumers? Would you be influenced by an ad if you saw that your friends liked it?
b) How do you feel about Facebook using your name in these types of ads?
Question 3
Vitaminwater-sounds healthy, right/ Although Vitaminwater has vitamins, it also has thirty-three grams-that's two heaping tablespoons-of sugar, making it not much better than a soda. Vitaminwater, owned by Coca-Cola, has been under fire from the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) a consumer-advocacy group that fights for safer, more nutritious foods. The CSPI filed a class-action lawsuit against Coca-Cola, claiming names for Vitaminwater flavors such as "endurance peach mango" and "focus kiwi strawberry" are misleading for two reasons: (1) The drinks contain zero to one percent•juice, and (2) words like endurance, focus, defense, rescue, and energy imply health benefits. Coca-Cola's defense was that reasonable consumers would not be misled into believing that Vitaminwater is healthy for them.
a) Do you think Coca-Cola is deliberately trying to deceive consumers into believing that Vitaminwater is a healthy alternative to soda? Why do you think so?
b) Find two other examples of brands that use names, words, colors, package shapes, or other elements to convey potentially deceptive meanings to consumers.